14.8.16

British rowers rule the waves

The Dutch team of Ilse Paulis and Maalke Head wins the women’s lightweight sculls

Britain ruled the Olympic waves on Friday, winning gold in the men’s four and women’s pair with army captain Heather Stanning and Helen Glover defending their 2012 title.

Also celebrating on day two of the rowing finals at the Rodrigo de Freitas Lagoon by Rio’s Copacabana beach were the Netherlands in the women’s double sculls.

Glover and Stanning were first to strike for Britain. The pair who registered the first gold for the London 2012 hosts four years ago comfortably accounting for New Zealand and Denmark.

They even went one better than Katherine Grainger, who became Britain’s most decorated female Olympian 24 hours earlier when landing double sculls silver at 40 despite taking a two-year sabbatical between London and Rio.

Glover and Stanning led throughout to become the first female British rowers to retain their Olympic crown.

Less than half an hour later their teammates Alex Gregory, George Nash, Moe Sbihi and Constantine Louloudis won the men’s coxless four.

The quartet prevailed at the expense of Australia and Italy for gold, Britain’s fifth successive Olympic win in the event.

Teammate Gregory spared a thought for the vanquished Aussies.

“We’re mates with them. That’s one of the hard things about sport, we’re all after the same thing, we’re just doing a job. It’s war out there and we feel bad for them.”

Ilse Paulis and Maalke Head of the Netherlands won the opening women’s lightweight sculls race in 7:04.03.

They came in ahead of Lindsay Jennerich and Patricia Obee of Canada and Huang Wenyi and Pan Feihong of China.

Another record

Britain’s quartet broke their own team pursuit world record at the Olympic track cycling tournament in Rio on Friday. Bradley Wiggins, Edward Clancy, Steven Burke and Owain Doull set a new mark of 3min 50.570sec, taking more than a second off their time from London four years ago.

It means Wiggins will claim an eighth Olympic medal, taking him past the British record mark of seven he holds with Chris Hoy, another track cyclist.

Wiggins has already four Olympic titles to his name, two in the individual pursuit, one in the team pursuit and one in the time-trial on the road.

South Korea’s Chang Hye-jin secured the third archery gold medal out of the possible four, in the women’s individual archery competition. On Thursday, Hye-jin defeated Germany’s Lisa Unruh 6-2, who took silver after winning bronze at the European Championships and gold at the World Championships.

Czechs’ first judo medal

Lukas Krpalek claimed the Czech Republic’s first ever Olympic judo medal by winning gold in the under-100kg division in Rio on Thursday.

“It’s amazing that I’m the first Czech to win a medal in judo, and on top of that it’s gold,” said the Czech judoka Krpalek.